If anyone hasn’t played this game yet: don’t read the article!
I highly recommend you experience this for yourself while knowing as little as possible about it. Top tier game.
A million percent agree. If you haven’t played it yet, look nothing up and play it as blindly as possible. I’m so glad I did and wish I could do it again.
My go-to game for the question: “if you could forget a game just to experience it all over again” such a perfect game
For real. It’s an amazing game that just can’t be the same again once you know all its secrets.
I bought it for two of my friends, and they both ended up hating it lol. I don’t blame them, but I think it’s very much to do with the mentality of how you approach the experience.
One friend just got plain stuck and gave up. The other found it frustrating that they were doing the same thing several times over, and just wanted to rush as quickly as they could to make progress.
Personally, I enjoyed the slow pace of discovery. I loved that feeling of being a true explorer, discoving facets of lost civilisation. Watching in melancholic awe as a world crumbled around me. Finding just a small piece of new information was always a joy, and made it feel worthwhile to get there, even if I’d done 90% of the journey before.
Slowly getting richer in a game where the only currency is knowledge.
I think if I played this game myself I never would have finished it. I actually watched a play through on YouTube by someone that was actually competent at puzzle games, and had a great experience. Then I ended up playing through it myself a few years later, knowing the story actually helped keep me motivated. It really is an incredible game.
Even if the common advice is to avoid spoilers, I’m glad you found your own way to enjoy it :)
I’m sure I could play it again myself and still enjoy the atmosphere, even if the discoveries weren’t new. Or maybe it would be fun to watch a stream of someone else playing for the first time instead!
I got confused more than anything - think I was missing a few key things.
Saying that, my answer would be subnautica.
This was the game where I couldn’t figure out how to fly the space ship properly, and then I went to land on a strange abandoned space station and couldn’t figure out what to do there beyond reading some alien text that didn’t make much sense, right?
I’m sure I didn’t give it a fair lick, it’s just it took up 2 hours of my time and didn’t hook or particularly engage me up to that point, so I didn’t feel like going back in and slogging through the slow burn to get to the good stuff.
That’s on me I suppose, I should try it again!
Does it pick up and get a little more interesting and robust, at least? I’m not looking for hardcore shooter action, but like, I dunno, interesting people, engaging quests and cool places to go whilst doing them, and such. Something to keep me interested, you know?
Everyone’s different, of course, walking simulators with the occasional small bit of world building text to read just aren’t for me is all.
Without giving any specific spoilers, the game has a primarily archaeological feel, you will be following breadcrumbs around to various places in the solar system (your journal is important!!!) and learning about the ancient civilization that mysteriously disappeared. finally piecing together the whole picture is one of the most powerful moments I’ve ever had in gaming. while there are some NPCs to talk to, the game is primarily driven by your own exploration and the knowledge you pick up along the way.
there’s no “correct order” to do things in, so if you feel like you’ve hit a dead end or you can’t figure out what you should be doing at a particular place, consider going somewhere else. and most importantly: follow your curiosity
There’s two essential ship functions, auto pilot and match velocity, it makes flying much easier
The auto pilot literally steered me into the sun.
Yeah it’ll do that. The little rascal.
Well it aims for the planet you want to go to, goes in a straight line and makes sure you don’t hit that planet by slowing down when getting close to it, if something gets in the way it doesn’t course correct though
In your ship there is a computer at the back (to the right when you enter). That computer contains a digital investigation board - y’know, with the photos connected by string and stuff.
Once you find that, the game really starts to make sense. It’s not a walking simulator, it’s an active crime scene. I won’t say what “crime” (and I’m being somewhat metaphorical here), in case you didn’t play long enough (about 12 minutes after you encounter the statue in the museum) for The Event to happen (The Event will make you think very differently about what this game is, but I can’t talk about that. We don’t talk about The Event). But that’s basically what’s happening. There’s a problem, and you have to solve it, but to do that you’ll have to unearth years of lost history, piecing together the story of an alien civilization that has visited your star system. The gameplay is primarily about exploration, trying to figure out where to find and how to get to the clues you need to put everything together. Slowly, the murder board fills in, the pieces connect, the list of suspects narrows, and you spiral in towards a genuinely shocking and heart wrenching conclusion.
Does it get good? My friend, it gets EPIC. The sheer scale the plot operates on is mind blowing. The ending destroyed me; easily one of the best stories I’ve ever encountered in a video game.
The flight mechanics are intentionally fiddly. You will get used to them eventually. The gameplay is exciting, sometimes terrifying, but don’t expect them to like give you a gun or anything. It’s a puzzle game, but the puzzles are never a fucking Sudoku. If you can handle that, it’s one of the best games ever made.
The investigation board didn’t really help me. Basically just said somewhere on this planet is a clue, so spend several loops trying to get into the locked areas. I also got tired of the janky physics and quit, even after successfully navigating the portal bramble place
Eh, if you made it that far then you made it far enough to know that the game just isn’t for you.
It really should be part of the title of the game. Outer Wilds: don’t look anything up, just play it.
I very nearly had to use a guide at one point but I stayed strong as everything I’d read said I’d regret it if I did. So glad I didn’t as the joy of discovery in this game is unparalleled. Top 5 gaming experience of all time, I reckon.
I tried, I really did. But a few hours in, I just didn’t like the gameplay even though I thought I would’ve loved it and the other new games I had waiting won.
Maybe I should grind through. Is there a point where it suddenly gets good a few hours in? Or is it just not for me, despite everything on the book’s cover?
If exploration, discovery, and puzzling out mysteries aren’t engaging for you, it might just not be your type of game.
I think it was the puzzles and lack of guidance. Not really knowing if I’m in the right place doing the right thing. Maybe I’ll try again with a bit of a guide until it hooks in and I get it.
There’s an in-game log of hints you’ve been given in the ship, the “rumor mode” on the terminal can help you stay goal-oriented.
If I could erase any game from my mind and experience it again for the first time, it would be this game. One of my favorites of all time.
When you do, please leave yourself a note reminding you to send me the mind eraser afterwards.
One of those games you can only experience once. Such a masterpiece!!
Once you finish it, it’s actually really fun watching other people’s playthroughs as well - getting to relive some of the moments vicariously through other people’s eyes is almost as much fun as experiencing them yourself the first time.
It’s also quite amazing just how different each playthrough can be, since the game is so non-linear, people take some crazy paths to get to the end ! It can be frustrating as well when someone just can’t see what is in front of their face though :)
There are also so many subtle elements scattered around that most people miss on their first playthrough, and watching someone else play it really made me appreciate many of the details I missed on my own playthrough and even make connections I didn’t before, and understand aspects of the story that I didn’t fully get the first time.
I keep trying to get the missus to play it, just so I can experience it again.
Playing this game anew would be an upside to early onset dementia for me.
I played this game and loved it but never finished it. I feel like I was either too dumb to figure out what to do next, or I could tell what I needed to do but couldn’t maneuver my ship/character well enough. Total skill issue on my part, though I intend to dive back in at some point.
Read a walkthrough if you have to. The ending is 10,000% worth experiencing, even if you need a little help to get there.
In fact, getting to the end with help from strangers actually feels more in keeping with the themes of the game.
Definitely this. It’s pretty easy to lookup exactly where you are and find mostly spoiler free walkthroughs or sometimes even hints. IIRC there are a few spots that a lot of people got hung up on.
This game is too good not to finish.
On the same boat.
I definitely want to go back and complete it some day.
Your ship computer shows hints and places you haven’t fully explored. Alternatively you could say where you are and helpful internet people can give you a nudge.
I know, like I said I was too dumb to figure out exactly what to do when I got there :-). I definitely plan on diving back in, though.
The Outer Wilds community is very helpful. Just post where you’re stuck and people will give you hints without spoilers!
one of my top favourite games of all time! And one of the two narrative experiences on that list that I can’t talk about with the “uninitiated” (other is Inscryption)
if you like space, and you like thinking - don’t look up anything about this game. Watch maybe 5 minutes of some gameplay if you’re hesitant.
Though a word of warning, this is a game that’ll take all of your focus, it’s very hard to play it with a YouTube video or a movie in playing the background. And yes the ship movement can feel clunky at first, you’ll get used to it don’t worry - the story is worth it
In my experience, if people are going to bounce off the game it’ll come down to one (or more) of three reasons:
- They hate the flight controls
- They hate the feeling of being on a constant timer
- They hate the lack of explicit direction in what to do next
It’s one of my favourite games of all time, and it has good reasons for all of the above, but it’s definitely not for everyone!
And for anyone wondering, my counterpoints to the above would be:
- Learn to use the autopilot but don’t trust it; learning to manoeuvre precisely will come over time
- Don’t overthink the timer element; pick just one thing to investigate and focus on that, anything else is a bonus
- Use the ship’s computer and follow the unknowns; avoid walkthroughs unless you’re absolutely 100% stumped on what to do next
in my experience as a impatient person you simply need to make peace with the timer, it stings at first but then- i think thanks to Outer Wilds i can play souls likes now ::: spoiler because it shows clearly how death is simply a part of the learning experience, it’s not a failure :::
i have no idea if this spoiler is working
It is working for me, at least. The spoilered text is a good summary of the idea too
Whether or not it’s a failure, it’s a waste of time. Imagine if a relaxed open world game constantly interrupted you with cutscenes of your character falling over, slowly waking up, and trudging back to where they fell.
it’s not supposed to be a relaxing open world game though?
it’s the mystery of the entire game, why is this happening? how do i stop it? It’s also the basis of all main mechanics in the game, the entire world is on the clock, some things aren’t available at the start or become unavailable as the clock ticks. It’s not a pointless gimmick, it serves both a narrative and a mechanical purpose
But there HAVE been other games based around time loops that manage to avoid that frustration, for instance by letting you manually restart the loop yourself in a quick way, or giving other starting points.
Famous examples include Majora’s Mask, The Sexy Brutale, and others. I understand Outer Wilds tries to hold the trappings of its story around the loop being more sci-fi than magic/fantasy in nature, but that’s still a goal of the writers to wrap the rules of the world around mechanics that are fun to play.
I can even think of many games that gave themselves minor plotholes and odd exceptions to the “world rules” just so that the player could get through it more conveniently.
You can manually restart in OW - it’s an ability you can learn from one of the characters you meet.
I have a friend who stopped for a whole other reason. But I can’t talk about it without revealing too much. But basically had to do with bramble and deep, things that don’t bother most people much, triggering some actual phobias.
I dealt with that too, sadly. Thankfully there is a mod that can alleviate it. (I’d link it but it’d also reveal spoilers…)
Nice, I’ll have to look those up for him. I keep trying to talk him into trying again.
One of the many games just sitting in my steam library, waiting to be played.
Play it today. You need to go in blind. It’s straightforward to learn and super rewarding to ay.
I still wish I didn’t watch a playthrough
My condolences
Someone told me the same thing, I started playing it but forgot about it, would need to restart it.
I’ll give you $10,000 to swap brains with you so I can play it for the first time again 😄
At first, the game will not make sense. But somewhere around the 20 minute mark (it varies depending on what you do) you will encounter The Event. It will happen. You will know it has happened. It will be, unmistakably, The Event. Nothing else could be The Event. Nothing else could possibly be as momentous as The Event. And then you will have your first real understanding of what the game is about, and it will be very, very exciting.
After that happens, look at the computer in the back of your ship (to the right as you enter). For the rest of the game this will be your most important tool. You’ll understand why. Once it happens.
Have fun.
But somewhere around the 20 minute mark (it varies depending on what you do) you will encounter The Event. It will happen. You will know it has happened. It will be, unmistakably, The Event. Nothing else could be The Event.
I love explanations like this, at first you don’t know what it might be, so anything could be the event, is this the event? No, is that the event? Also no. And then you come across the event and you just know, yes, that’s the event
If you’re particularly clever, you might see something before the event that makes you go, huh, that seems weird, I wonder why that is. And then the event happens and you’re like, ohh, it was the event! It was telling me the whole time!
A friend begged me to play this and I just didn’t for a couple years despite owning it. Once I finally did it quickly became an all-time favorite. You should fix this yourself.
This is one of the best games I have ever played. I know this phrase goes around every day, but I wholeheartedly mean it.
This is the type of game you can only place once, and the experience is incomparable to much of anything else
I had the solution to the main game spoiled for me YEARS ago. I have the game sitting on an external hard drive, just waiting for my brain to forget.
The game is magical even with that one spoiler. Hell, I’d go so far as to say the puzzles aren’t even as important as the themes and story.
You should definitely play it!
I have beat the game. I remember the gist of the solution, but I have no idea how to pull it off any more. I can’t wait to play it again, possibly with the VR mod.
This game is a Masterpiece!
When I got echoes of the eye, I was confused as to how to play it. Once I figured it out, my mind was blown for a second time. I wish, as others have said, I could re-experience this game.
I still remember how confused I was when story DLC was announced for a game which I considered to be complete story wise.
Turns out the story was not complete.
I’m really struggling with this game. I got it on sale and played for 3+ hours, but somehow it didn’t grip me. It was really annoying having to constantly start over. Not trying to detract from other people’s experience of it.
So one thing I didn’t realize right away is that in the ship there is a board where the game auto stores your discoveries detective-style. It really helps provide guidance when you feel like you’re out of leads or don’t know what to do.
On the one hand, if you don’t enjoy the game that’s fine. It’s a masterpiece, but that doesn’t magically mean that everyone will enjoy it.
That said, if you want to enjoy it more, focus on one thing per loop, everything is designed to be completable in a single loop, (or maybe a few for the more complicated puzzles if you get stuck). And if something is frustrating, do something else.
Things really go wrong if you keep smashing your head against a brick wall or if you keep jumping around and never manage to finish anything.
We’re trained to think of death as a major failure by other games, it’s not in this one, it’s just jumping back home, repairing the ship, and starting from a central location and a known state.
It takes some getting used to. And maybe looping games isn’t everyone’s cup of tea(e.g. Majora’s mask).
But the exploration, the knowlesge based progression, the cleverness of the story, and its delivery is absolutely brilliant.
It’s a hard game to get into. Played for 2 hours on my first run and didn’t know where to go.
After 2 weeks or so I tried again because everyone was recommending it to me. Now it’s one of my favorites, even though it took another 2 hours before I had any idea what I was doing.
same here. i keep hearing good things and restarting the game but every time I’m just losing interest by the first hour.
The most common gripe I hear is the ship controls. It’s really designed for controller, and manual space flight is kind of pointless when the autopilot can do it so much better (as long as there’s nothing in the way).
It’s really a game about pulling threads until you find interesting things. The ship’s computer is useful for keeping track of the thread ends. Most places can be reached in a minute or so right from the main planet, although depending on where you’re going you might have to wait longer to get access to what you want. There isn’t really any “starting over” because what you’re gathering is knowledge in your own head.
I think the hardest part initially is finding an interesting thread to pull on. I think Giant’s Deep was where it started to click for me, but there’s undoubtedly more.
I beat it last week. Amazing game.
Can’t wait to get the DLC and play it!
I put off playing it for ages because I didn’t know how it could possibly stand up to the main game.
It does, and more so. Enjoy.
My favourite lets player has finally picked this up. I will neverbe able to experience it fresh ever again… So watching others is the closest I’ll ever get.
After playing this game I watched so many streams and let’s play of it. I enjoyed seeing how people did it differently than me.
I also convinced my partner to play it on Christmas as my gift for me to watch. (They were instantly hooked)
This is one on my favorite games ever
It’s so much fun to watch other people figure things out. It’s the closest we can get to playing the game again.
My partner tried to play…
But sadly they struggle with that"platforming" mostly Brittle Hollow
I personally brute forced it with my space ship!
Which Let’s Player? I’m always looking for new ones I’ll like.
A YouTuber by the name of Kikoskia. Just started
I have previously really enjoyed a play through by a YouTuber by the name of Welomz which is long complete.
Let me know if you try either
Welonz is one of the best Let’s Players out there so you have good taste. I’ll check out Kikoskia.
There’s a really well done VR mod for this game. It’s actually the only way I’ve played it so far. If you can run Steam VR I highly recommend it! I had to do a reinstall of some stuff so haven’t finished the game yet, but it’s been high on my ‘to-do list’.
Yes it is wonderful, especially floating in space and just drifting. But be aware, certain parts are… intense in VR.
Yeah, I bet there are some fishy sequences.
Sounds like the pukiest VR game yet. I’m in.
Oh shit. I’m bookmarking this. I might have to set up my Vive Pro again after so many years…
I’m testing it in VR, the modder did an amazing job. Unfortunately my GPU absolutely blows with VR games (Intel Arc A770)
What headset do you use? I thought getting a a770 meant no VR for me… wish it would render Celeste properly lol
Lenovo Explorer. I don’t play VR games really, but it’s fun when my little nephews visit (the A770 handles simple games like Beat Saber well). Outer Wilds in VR seemed like a good time to dust of the headset but it’s a bit too stuttery. I didn’t look for any type of fix or optimization though.
But if you’re serious about VR gaming Intel Arc is not a good idea for now. However on /r/intelarc some report good results, saying it varies from game to game.
It looks like I will be nearly the only dissenter here. I didn’t care for the game.
PROS:
- The music and sound design were completely appropriate and fit the world.
- An initially interesting story setup.
- Some of the planets have a SUPER cool premise and are a joy to explore.
- The DLC adds some much-needed (albeit mild) horror elements.
NEUTRALS:
- Achievements are implemented, but are mostly for irrelevant side activities. Do you like using a guide to figure out how to get all the achievements? Well, you will have to.
CONS:
- This is not an adventure game, this is a puzzle game first and foremost. If you are not down with figuring out hundreds of vague Dark Souls-style lore blurbs scattered all over in order to work out how to solve environmental puzzles to progress, do not get this game.
- In the same vein, if you are not down with having a loop end before you’re done exploring an area only to have to trek all the way back there and go through everything all over again in case you missed something, do not get this game. This could be partially solved by having the logs you find on a planet permanently NOT GLOW any more after you had read their chain, or maybe a ship notice letting you know there were undecyphered texts on a planet still. I had to re-tread an astounding amount of ground just to make sure I wasn’t missing something.
- When your ship directs you to a planet that you need something from, the navigation on some of them is so obtuse that I found several places I could not find again even after dozens of visits to their planets. A map or better signposting would alleviate this.
- The characters were deeply forgettable, and you are constantly inundated with dozens of gibberish alien names so unless you follow a lore guide or take notes, you’re not going to figure out who did what. And speaking of…
- The story has a veneer of “pretty good sci-fi” but is told quite poorly. You will beat the game, get the incredibly lacklustre ending that doesn’t close out the story in any way, and watch one of many lore explanation videos that will make things click into place. The fact that the lore videos have SO MANY HITS is endemic of the fact that this is a narrative poorly delivered. You will find the lore in random order. If spread over multiple sessions like I played, this will mean you will not make some absolutely needed connections.
- Many things do not make sense within the context of the world and there is no reason for them to be happening at the time except for the hand-waving “It’s a video game” excuse, which breaks immersion. Why only now is sand being moved from one planet to another at the beginning of a cycle? Why only now is one planet being broken by lava? These (and other that I can not speak about due to spoilers) are not explained - the systems have existed for ages and would have (and should have given the environments they set up) occurred before this, but because it makes for a more interesting setup, it all happens now.
- The controls are… an acquired taste at best. Look at many of the negative reviews; many state the controls as an issue. There is a reason for this, even though I did become accustomed to them over time. I swapped to a controller and it was less bad. The keyboard and mouse controls are abysmal.
- I played the final build after the DLC came out, and even this far in development, I had some severe bugs. Controls would get “stuck” and force a game restart, achievements didn’t unlock correctly, etc.
- I wound up quitting because I didn’t know what to do next and didn’t care to watch yet another video to figure it out. There were hundreds of text logs that may or may not have been useful, and no idea how to find what was missing to help me progress without consulting guides, and it became too much. I eventually realized that I was just throwing time into a hole with nothing to show for it. It genuinely felt like it wanted me to give up and I couldn’t help but oblige. I just… stopped. I hated it. I kept doing the same thing over and over and eventually felt that I wasn’t enjoying anything. I hate the very concept of repetition as a game mechanic unless executed well; this wasn’t executed well.
- Despite quitting, I have seen all the endings. The real ending is legitimately nonsense and is basically an appeal to emotion while leaving the reality of the universe behind. It abandons the premise with what can only be described as a narrative hug that does essentially nothing, but presents the veneer of “feel good.” It is nothing. It is empty. Everyone but me loves it for this, and I can’t figure out why.
CONCLUSION: Meh? I really don’t understand the adoration people have for this game. It’s a mediocre non-combat roguelike with about 3 hour of content they’ve spread over 20 hours. It feels very much like a case of style over substance. This game genuinely makes me sad. I really wanted to like it, but… ugh. It feels like work.
The alien names aren’t gibberish - they’re all mineral and plant names. Made it really easy for me to keep track of lore, actually, having something to tie the characters to conceptually. Absolutely true that it’s a puzzle game first and foremost.
